Rejoice For Thy Salvation Is At Hand

11-12-2016. SECOND SUNDAY OF ADVENT (GAUDETE) (A)

SCRIPTURAL READING:

Is. 35:1-6a.10
Ps 146:6c-7.8-9a.9bc-10 (R.Is 35:4)
2 James 5:7-10; Accl; Lk. 4:18.
Gospel Mt. 11:2-11

Preamble:

Dear friends please repeat these words after me;
Thank you Jesus for your word which I will receive at this hour,
Please Lord, make my heart a fertile soil for the reception of your word today
Holy Spirit, rekindle in me the fire of your love and may God’s word bear fruit in my life. Amen.

TOPIC: REJOICE FOR THY SALVATION IS AT HAND

The central theme and tone for today’s liturgy-the third Sunday of Advent is “Rejoice” it takes its root from Philippians 4:4-6 “may you always be joyful in your union with the Lord. I say it again: rejoice! Show a gentle attitude towards everyone. The Lord is coming soon. Don’t worry about anything, but in all your prayers ask God for what you need, always asking him with a thankful heart. It also has it’s also in psalm 85:1 “Lord, you have been merciful to your land; you have made Israel prosperous again.”

This Sunday is known as Gaudete Sunday or Joy Sunday. It is a Sunday filled with joyful hope that the saviour is sure to come. We are called to rejoice in the Lord. The one who rejoices is the one who has discovered something about the Lord, the one whom the Lord has done something great for. He or she is filled with that joy and wants to share that joy with others. The soul that rejoices is the soul in which the Lord is glorified.

This third Sunday of advent, our joy is that we are awaiting on the first hand the annual commemoration of the Nativity of the Lord on the other hand the waiting for second coming of the Lord and most importantly, the mercy and love we have received from the Lord.
Christianity is not a gloomy religion but the joy of been in the presence of the Lord because he is ever present in our midst. He is close to us in our times of need, a ready helper, compassionate and merciful.

If we are to rejoice, it is because we have waited patiently, found him, we know him because we have experienced him and we are ready to share this joy with others. That is what happened in the life of Mary as we heard during the retreat in which Fr. Godfrey re-echoed the solemn words of Saint Ambrose’s commentary on the Gospel of St. Luke. He told us that when the angel was announcing the mysteries to the Virgin Mary, he also told her as a precedent (an example), to help her to believe, that an old and barren woman had conceived. This was to show that God can do everything that pleases him.

When Mary heard this she hurried off to the hill country. This was not because she disbelieved the oracle, or was uncertain about the messenger, or doubted the example offered, but because she was overjoyed with desire, eager to fulfil a duty of piety, and impelled by gladness.

Where could she who was filled with God hasten to except to the heights? There is no such thing as delay in the working of the Holy Spirit. The arrival of Mary and the blessings of the Lord’s presence are also speedily declared. ‘As soon as Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and she was filled with the Holy Spirit.’

Notice the choice of words and their precise meaning. Elizabeth was the first to hear the voice; but John was the first to experience grace. She heard according to the order of nature; he leaped because of the mystery. She recognised the arrival of Mary; he the arrival of the Lord. The woman recognised the woman’s arrival; the child, that of the child. The women speak of grace; the babies make it effective from within to the advantage of their mothers who, by a double miracle, prophesy under the inspiration of their babies.

The infant leaped, the mother was filled with the spirit. The mother was not filled before the son, but after the son was filled with the Holy Spirit, he filled his mother too. John leaped and the spirit of Mary rejoiced. As John leaped, Elizabeth is filled, but we know that Mary was not filled but her spirit rejoiced. For he who cannot be comprehended was working in his mother’s womb in ways beyond comprehension. Elizabeth was filled with the spirit after she had conceived, and Mary before. ‘Blessed are you,’ she said, ‘who believed.’

But you too, who have heard and have believed, are blessed. Every soul who has believed both conceived and generates the word of God and recognises his works.
If we too must rejoice, the word of God-which is Christ Jesus must be alive in us as it was in Mary. Because it was alive, it led her to testify, to share and then rejoice. This word of God is the cause of Joy.

It is that word that sets us free,  it is that word that counsels us, it is that word that inspires, motivates, moves us, builds, shakes foundation, reaffirms, establishes, favours, is an armour and spiritual ammunition against the forces of darkness, it is the foundation of the just, the strong hold of the righteous, it is the word that brings deliverance.

No one encounters the word and remains the same he will be like what John says in John 7:38 “whoever believes in me, streams of life-giving water will pour out from his heart.”  When that word comes into you, you will be what the word of God says in John 15:5 “I am the vine, and you are the branches. Whoever remains in me, and I in him, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without me.”

It is that word that produces in us through the action of the Holy spirit, fruits of the Holy spirit which the letter of St. Paul to the Galatians 5: 22 “Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility and self-control.” This becomes our testimony to a world filled with doubt about the presence and power of God to save it. It is our testimony to a world that has embraced strange gods of modernity because of the crisis of our time.

It is our testament to a world filled with pain and misery, malice and hatred, sadness and boredom, guilt and shame, fear and worry as well as anxiety. It is only in encountering this word both as word which directs and word as that which is made flesh and dwelt among us (Eucharist) can we be free of the anxieties and worries of our time that tends to say there is no need for joy.

Our joy can become contagious if we expose ourselves daily to the Lord. It is only from the presence of the Lord who is the fountain of living water can joy flow and be full that is why Neh. 8:10 says, the joy of the Lord is my strength. It is believe in this word made flesh that makes us great in the kingdom of God even though we have not seen him but it is our faith that justifies us-Romans 8:1-2 there is no condemnation now for those who live in union with Christ Jesus. For the law of the spirit, which brings us life in union with Christ Jesus, has set me free from the law of sin and death.

It is that word that will enable us wait for him until he comes as the second reading of today tells us. It gives us the clear example of the patience of the farmer who waits for the precious fruit of the earth. How can we wait for him if we have not known him and love as he has first loved us? How can we wait for him when the world we live in is on a jet speed and wants everything else except the worship of the true God.

The question is not whether he will come the question is when he comes will he find us faithful and waiting?
Beloved the real obstacle to us waiting for the lord is the hardening of our hearts. We can only wait appropriately for the one we love. We make out time for his word daily, so that this word directs us, counsel us, sustain us and move us in the way of the Lord, then and only then can it be said that we are able to wait as we should.

The waiting includes removing obstacles to faith, embracing virtues such as been charitable even amidst these hard times, and removing the excesses in our lives such as impatience, excessive drinking and talking, unforgiveness and hate, grudge and malice.

Beloved let us daily not leave the presence of the Lord-for one second outside the presence of the lord is expensive. The quality time we spend in the presence of the Lord gives us joy let us not forgo it for any reason. Let us make every effort to spend time in his presence for it is very rewarding. True joy is an inner joy. It comes from way down deep. The whole person is affected by it, which springs not more from the head than from the heart. Inner joy issues not in loud laughter, but in still smiles which lie deeper. A smile that goes no further than the lips is no good.

The inner joy is the offshoot of love and grows in simplicity. It enables one to be concretely aware of reality. It is a sign of balance, of intelligence and wisdom. The inner joy is the joy of the whole person who is aware of the glorious privilege to live, to act, to communicate, to listen, to share, to behold, to love. True joy does not exclude any affection or other activities; on the contrary, it includes them. It is essentially wide and rich, brings all within its scope, takes to itself all our faculties and all our senses, embraces in its sweep all that we do, all that we think, all that we love.

Jeannine Jordan tells us to live in joy is to live for God in every passing second. It is to respond with every heartfelt sigh to all that dwells around you; it is to penetrate the clamour and listen for the stirring of a faint and voiceless soul or the whimper of a wounded heart.

To live in joy is to recognize that life is not a race and that the future is as distant as the past. It is letting every moment be a discovery, an act of grace and beauty. It is to savour the serenity found in solitude, and to live each day as if it were the first and the last and the only day of life.

To live in joy is to discover the world for the first time every morning without having outgrown the scars and the sweetness of yesterday. It is to wonder and aspire. It is to receive triumph and failure alike, humbly and purely. And it is to have been defeated without having been destroyed.

To live in joy is to seek all things beautiful and beauty in all things. It is to behold a blinding sunrise and a single blade of grass with the same amount of reverence. It is to realize that beauty and contentment are not bound to each other, and that loneliness, sorrow, and despair are all in accordance with joy.

To live in joy is to embrace the world with love. It is to love wholly and freely and to have drained your heart of all its longing. For an empty heart draws from the wealth of the soul, whereby emerges the deepest and most sensitive love of all.

To live in joy is to abide like the stars: each one reflecting the sun, but each in its own time, own distance, own strength-never knowing fear of being different or alone.
Joy belongs to anyone who wants it. You cannot keep its splendour to yourself. And anyone possessing it owns a pearl of insight-that all life is a joy indeed.
Joy means keeping your peace with the lord even in the midst of so much.

Prayer: teach us oh Lord to create time for you even in the midst of so much fear, worry, anxiety and challenges that we may come to great joy and everlasting peace. This we ask through Christ our lord. Amen.